Terminal City
by lisa316
Summary: The events that transpired after Freak Nation.  ML pairing, Alec friendly.
1. WouldaCouldaShoulda

_Disclaimer: I don't own Dark Angel and nobody has ever offered to pay me for any of this._

**Terminal City**

Chapter I

Woulda-Couda-Shoulda

Logan absentmindedly stared at the smoldering bonfires and scarce lights that were scattered over the sleeping city. He tried to concentrate on his work, but his gaze kept going towards the window. It was late and he was tired, so his mind wandered and refused to focus on the task at hand. The old, familiar doubts crept into his head, and he couldn't help but wonder yet again what would have been if they had never tried to take down Manticore.

He let out a soft sigh. It had seemed like such a good idea at the time.

That night was meant to destroy the one thing that threatened Max's safety and security, to eliminate the need for her to run anymore. Once Manticore was gone, she was supposed to be free to have a normal life. Maybe even a life with him.

It didn't exactly go over like it was supposed to, though, did it?

Logan couldn't stop himself from making a mental list of all the _what ifs _and _could've beens_ had they not tried to take down Manticore. If they had left it alone, Max would never have been captured. She would never have been infected with a virus that was targeted to kill him with the slightest touch. The Manticore anomalies would never have been set free into the city and she would never have become the _de facto_ leader of a transgenic army.

The last year had been pure hell because of that ill conceived plan. He had watched Max die, and for awhile, he would have been content to join her. For days he didn't eat or sleep or move; he would have stopped breathing and having a heartbeat as well if involuntary muscles hadn't taken over. Only a manic desire for revenge and an inexplicable certainty that she couldn't really be gone had eventually become enough to make him get up and carry on, but it wasn't really living. It had just kept him going long enough to deliver the final blow, exposing Manticore and destroying them once and for all. It really had seemed like the right thing to do…at the time.

When she reappeared, the world suddenly came into focus again, and he was filled with the precious certainty that life was wondrously beautiful and he would never let her go again. That feeling lasted for about forty-five seconds, before it was replaced by the feeling of fire in his lungs as he struggled to breath and a nauseating dizziness that had him falling to the floor, as Manticore took their own parting shot back at him through an unsuspecting Max.

He should have just left it alone.

Logan had watched her grow farther and farther away from him, terrified to get to close because of the damned virus and overwhelmed by so many new responsibilities. Every escaped nomaly, every displaced soldier…by taking out Manticore, they had assumed responsibility for all of them.

If they had _just left it alone_, the nightmare that was the last year of their lives might never have happened. They might still have their old lives, she might still be his, and he most certainly wouldn't be hiding out in a gutted conference room in an abandoned biotech office building in Terminal City, helping the transgenics reestablish their communications network to defend themselves against the military that had begun to surround the perimeter.

They had been trapped in Terminal City for a little over twenty-four hours. It had only taken a day for the police to barricade them in and call in the military for reinforcements. At first, rioters and news crews surged against the fence, but they had been forced back a few hours ago in preparation for a strategic assault, and it was eerily quiet as they waited for the attack to begin.

He wouldn't leave, even though he knew the raid might come at any time. He wouldn't leave her.

He tried to keep the tired clichés from invading his thoughts, but phrases like _'The road to hell is paved with good intentions'_ and _'Better the devil you know'_ and still ran through his mind sometimes. Especially when he was tired.

He shook himself and pulled his gaze away from the window and back to the circuit board he was repairing. He didn't have time to feel sorry for himself, he had work to do and lives were on the line. There was no point wishing for what could have been. It was what it was, and he needed to deal with it. Besides, Manticore was evil and needed to end; the transgenics needed to be set free. It had been the right thing to do.

But there were times when Logan was sick to death of doing the right thing, and times when he kicked himself for it, and times when he wished he could go back and do things differently. Would the world really end if he were selfish once in awhile?

He closed his eyes for a moment, trying to refocus, and let out a mirthless chuckle as he realized that the era of Manticore hunting Max down had been the good ol' days. He supposed there was nothing like being trapped in a biohazardous waste dump surrounded by rioting masses and trigger happy militia to make you appreciate the golden years.

He replaced the circuit board and tested the connection. Logan had to acknowledge that the transgenics had done quite well, considering the waste and junk piles they had to work with. They had put together an elaborate computer network entirely out of scavenged parts, but there was no back up to their communication system, and with a confrontation eminent, a fallback system would be essential. It was all they had, and he hoped it would be enough.

"Hey, Logan," Alec called to him from the doorway, interrupting Logan's musings. "Come downstairs. We've got a situation."

"Where's Max?" Logan asked, apprehensive at Alec's terse summon. He had learned that when Alec was concise, something was definitely wrong.

"Still underground," Alec answered. "You know how that girl loves her sewers. Of course, she's never here when it hits the fan, is she? We've gotta go; they're waiting on us."

Logan quickly gathered his computer components and followed Alec downstairs, wondering exactly how many straws it took before the camel's back finally snapped.

xxXXxx

_**Long, rambling author's note:**__ This story originally bloomed from a snippet challenge response I wrote for BBWW (Grapefruit Diet thread, 20th response down if you're interested). A couple of people casually mentioned that I should continue the idea, which got me to thinking about everything I would have done had I been in charge of Season 3. Next thing I knew, I had an outline and a story and, well, you know how it goes…_

_So here's the fun part-- As I was mapping the plot out, I realized that there is a lot of flexibility in this tale, so I've decided to take requests. If there's anything you would have liked to have seen in S3 (characters, plot twists, sexy death and violence, whatever) drop it in a review and I'll try to work it in for you. This way we can all finally have Dark Angel closure together!_

_If you like it, please let me know. If you hate it, blame Mia and Mari…it's really all their fault for putting the idea in my head in the first place. _

_Thanks for reading. More to come soon._


	2. Shouldn't That Guy Be Dead?

Terminal City

Chapter II

Shouldn't That Guy Be Dead?

The command center at Terminal City was like the rest of the compound: dangerously haphazard and highly efficient. While they were living underground, the Manticore refugees had scavenged and lifted everything they could find that would serve their purposes, almost instinctively turning their new home from a squatter's refuge to a military stronghold. The shift from hiding to siege was fairly seamless, simply because it was what they knew how to do, and within hours of the unanimous decision to stay and fight, surveillance equipment, sensors, communications, and weapons systems were on-line, even if they were mostly assembled from paper clips and duct tape and wire coat hangers.

"What's going on?" Logan demanded as he followed Alec downstairs.

"You're gonna have to see this to believe it," Alec assured him as they entered the busy room, glowing with the light from many computer monitors.

A series of cameras had been installed to keep an eye on the perimeter, and before their location had been discovered by the ordinaries, there had been nothing to see except the occasional vagrant or stray cat, and the transgenic who had the watch duty spent most of the day playing Spider Solitaire on an extra monitor. Since then, however, there was constant activity on the screens. The police and National Guard milled about and made their presence felt at all the known exits, protesters hurled rocks and shouted epithets at the main gate, and a media circus swarmed around the activity, interviewing anyone who felt like sharing an opinion.

It wasn't the routine chaos outside their gates that held everyone's attention, however, as Logan and Alec joined the others. Far away from all the people and actions, a lone figure stood outside the fence, confidently staring straight into a camera. Donald Lydecker was patiently waiting to be recognized.

"Well, I'll be damned," Logan muttered, staring incredulously at the video screen alongside all the other transgenics.

"Told ya," Alec reminded him.

"Do you believe the stones on this guy, just showing up like that?" Mole mumbled around his cigar as he glared at Lydecker's image on the screen.

"Is there a way to bring him in?" Logan asked.

"Sure. Already got a team bringing him in through a hole in the fence that they don't know about. But just say the word - I can get on the radio and tell them to shoot the S.O.B. on sight instead."

"Not a bad plan. 'Course, we shoot him, we'll never know what he's up to," Alec reasoned.

"No, but it would make me feel all warm and fuzzy inside," Mole explained.

They all watched on the screen as a small group of x-5s suddenly appeared around Lydecker and seemingly just as quickly disappeared from view again in a move that was so smooth it might as well have been choreographed.

"We want to bring him in, right, Logan?" Luke asked from his station in front of the monitors. "Isn't Colonel Lydecker one of the good guys now? Max says that he was the one that helped you take down Manticore."

Logan had been wondering why they were all looking to him for reassurance and approval. Even though he had formed strong ties with some of the transgenics in the preceding weeks, and they would occasionally consult him regarding network communications or life outside, it was painfully clear that in military matters, they considered him an under-foot civilian. Yet when Lydecker appeared outside their walls, they had sent for him, as though he were in charge of this specific contingency in Max's absence, simply because familiarity bred expertise.

"I guess Lydecker's a good guy…sort of. Either way, he's here for a reason," Logan firmly declared. "We need to hear what he has to say; it might help us. Just…don't let your guard down around him."

"Not a problem," Mole said as he slipped a new clip into his sidearm with an ominous click. They heard him quietly mutter, "Good guy, my scaly green ass," as they waited for the retrieval party to return with their uninvited guest.

When Lydecker arrived with his escort, he looked almost indecently confident. The colonel gave the room a cursory once over before he focused in on Logan and sauntered up to him like an old friend. "Bet you didn't expect to see me here."

"Not really," Logan answered with a lopsided, sarcastic smile. "I just figured you were dead."

"I need to speak with Max," Lydecker declared. "Where is she?"

"She's out."

"Where?"

"Day spa," Logan answered levelly. "Getting a seaweed wrap. Don't suppose you want to tell me what's going on in the meantime?"

"I'll wait, thanks," Lydecker answered with the ghost of a smile.

Lydecker continued to inspect and evaluate the command center as if he were making sure it had been set up to his exact specifications and nodded his approval at the X-5s watching him. "You've built a good stronghold here. You have a hand in this, 494?"

"Alec," was his muted, carefully neutral response.

"What's that, soldier?"

"It's Alec now," he repeated clearly, fixing Lydecker with a defiant stare, his indifference now lost in the annoyance that had been building ever since his former commander had walked into the room, making him fight the irritating compulsion to stand at attention and call him sir.

"Ah yes. Part of the re-indoctrination back in '09 was to discourage the use of personal names. Ineffective strategy, I always told them it wouldn't stick. I don't suppose you remember the re-indoctrination, do you, Alec?"

"I remember the re-indoctrination," Alec said quietly, dangerously so. "We all do." Another X-5 moved silently to stand behind Alec, wordlessly backing him up.

The tension in the room escalated to a level that was almost tangible, and Logan reexamined the animosity of the transgenics surrounding him. Everyone in that room had suffered at the hands of Lydecker and Manticore, probably much more than Max ever had. And even though they had the strength to rip Lydecker's throat out with their bare hands, they were initially wary to approach the man who had terrorized them into submission for so long. Logan suddenly understood Lydecker's bravado. It was what was keeping him alive in enemy territory.

"You know, Lydecker, coming here may not have been the best thing for your health," Logan said, pausing for a moment to let the message sink in before adding, "We're sort of in the middle of a siege right now; we might take fire any minute."

"Yes, I noticed that on my way in. Don't worry, they won't fire." There was something eerie in Donald Lydecker's smile, making it hard to find reassurance in his words.

"What makes you say that?" asked Logan.

"I told them not to."

"I didn't realize _that_ was an option," Luke chimed in from his station at the monitors.

"Let's just say that I've been in this business long enough to know a lot of people. Many of them owe me favors, others just know better than to cross me. I convinced the right people that it would be a grave mistake to attack this facility…at least for the time being. Besides, we have bigger things to worry about," he added cryptically.

"What sort of bigger things?" Logan prodded.

"Bigger things that will have to wait for Max," Lydecker reminded him.

"What sort of bigger things?" repeated a female voice from the doorway, where Max was leaning against the wall with a skeptical leer on her face and a cautious eye on Donald Lydecker. She added, "I thought you were supposed to be dead."

"There seems to be a lot of that going around, but we have more important things to worry about than those tasteful lilies you failed to send. I would ask you for a private conference," he said with a sideways glance at Logan, "but I know you'll want to fill him in on all the details anyway, and I don't have time to go through everything twice. Something big is about to happen, Max, something that only you can stop, and this little war you decided to fight with the local yokels put a major crimp in the schedule. We don't have any more time to waste on trivialities."

"So cut the cryptic and spill it," Max answered impatiently, "because dropping everything and jumping on board with your personal agenda generally doesn't work out well for me, and we're pretty busy around here these days."

"Max, you may think you know who Ames White is, but you've just scratched the surface. He's involved with a clandestine organization that used to share ties with Manticore, but one that has been around for thousands of years, and getting more powerful and dangerous all the time. One of their members, a geneticist named Dr. Sandeman, was in charge of the genetic mapping that went into most of Manticore's designs. Sandeman had very specific plans for you, Max, plans that he encoded into your DNA before you were ever created, and that makes you the most unique and valuable person on the planet right now."

"Yeah, we know all that already," was her unimpressed response. "He tagged it all over my skin. I'm the new tattooed messiah, lucky me. The problem is that Daddy Sandeman seems to have dropped off the face of the earth, so I can't exactly ask him what any of it means. Got anything we _don't_ know yet?"

"Yes," Lydecker assured her. "Sandeman's in a room in the hotel across the street, waiting to get into his lab. And he really wants to talk to you."

xxXXxx

_A/N: Sorry for the delay with this update; I got distracted by a shiny object. I'll make it up to everyone with a promise that the virus will be cured over the course of this story, since you guys seem to want that to happen. (Like I would do it any other way… :p)_

_Lydecker was for __**Blue**__, although he probably would have shown up anyway…I have a thing for him too._

_Per __**Mari**__'s request, Alec will get some attention, and maybe even his own moment in the sun a little later. And yes, __**Shy**__, he knows the score._

_**Annie**__, I can't quite lose the snake cult yet, since I need a villain to keep this thing going, but I'll keep them in the background and I promise that they won't win._

_**Fairyfloz**__, I'm working on it for you, but it might have to be a little different than what you asked for._

_Anybody want to see anything else? Just let me know, I'm granting wishes._


	3. A Meeting with the Manufacturer

Terminal City

Chapter III

A Meeting with the Manufacturer

"I'm sorry, but have you been drinking cough syrup again?" Alec demanded incredulously. "Because you're saying some crazy things."

Alec, Logan and Max had retreated to the small conference room to discuss the newest information bombshell that had fallen into their laps. It was a small, windowless room, and Logan was fairly certain that it was meant to be a janitor's closet, but it had thick concrete walls, and there weren't very many places where three people could have a private conversation when surrounded by a transgenic army with super hearing.

"Look, I'm not saying we should give him the keys to the city or anything," Logan temporized, "but it couldn't hurt to let him in and hear what he has to say. Lydecker and Sandeman might have some useful information, and in case you haven't noticed, information is one of the many things we're lacking lately."

"I can't believe you want to trust Colonel Lydecker and let him bring in the mad scientist that cooked us up," Alec focused his attention on Max this time, hoping to persuade her. "Don't we have enough problems already?"

"Logan's right, Alec. We need information, and talking to Sandeman has been on top of the to-do list forever. C'mon, how many chances do you get to meet your maker? I want to know what the hell is up with White's snake cult and what all these damn symbols mean and how he managed to get them into my skin."

Logan added, "Just because he used to be Manticore and he's being delivered by Lydecker doesn't change the fact that we need him, Alec."

"I know," Alec agreed. "You guys are right, but that doesn't make it any less stupid."

"Since when do we ever do anything the smart way?" Max countered back.

"Go tell Lydecker to set up the meet. You know, if they haven't already defenestrated him while we were talking."

"Yeah, maybe better not to leave him alone too long with Mole. Or whatever," Max shrugged, realizing she didn't really care that much if her former C.O. was being tormented behind closed doors. "We doing this thing in the old lab?"

"Might as well," Logan said as Max was already heading back towards the command center.

Logan and Alec walked away in the opposite direction, heading for the old biotech laboratory that supposedly once belonged to Dr. Sandeman. The journey was silent, and by the time they entered the room the quiet had gone from companionable to decidedly awkward, a tense reminder of everything that they had been through over the last few weeks.

"I get it," Alec finally supplied, mostly because he couldn't take another moment of the awkwardness. "I just have a hard time being on the same side as Lydecker, I guess."

"Yeah. Yeah, that makes sense."

There was another moment of silence. "So, um…how are you feeling?" Logan asked with a nod towards Alec's injured side.

"Punctured," he answered. "But it's alright. My kind, we heal fast."

"Yeah, I've heard that," Logan answered dryly.

"How about you," Alec asked with a nod towards Logan's legs. "That last transfusion and everything…You still feeling alright?"

"Yeah," he answered quickly. "Yeah. You know…Happy to be feeling anything at all, really."

"Right," Alec agreed quietly. Another uncomfortable pause followed. "So, hey, listen. Thanks for helping me out back there at Jam Pony. I mean, I would have been fine on my own once I got my second wind and everything, but, you know…thanks. I owe you."

"Don't worry about it. We're all in this together, right?"

"Right. About that…Max is totally going to kick my ass for this, but you deserve to know. She and I, we aren't technically together, you know. She just said that."

"I know," Logan said.

"She tell you?"

"No. But I know. I know her better than she thinks I do."

"Yeah, you probably do," Alec quietly agreed. "Besides, I could never hook up with a girl like Maxie. WAY too much emotional baggage, and talk about high-maintenance....Honestly, I don't know what you see in her at all. So, we square then?"

"Yeah, we're good," Logan assured him.

"Okay. Good."

The were saved from the awkwardness of further bonding and the threat of a make-up hug by Joshua, who had bound into the old lab with the eagerness of a child on Christmas morning.

"Max says Father is coming," his smile was wide, and Logan was sure that if Joshua had a tail, it would have been wagging.

Mole followed through the open door, escorting a wary Donald Lydecker at gunpoint. He bit the end off of a fresh cigar and spit it into the corner. "Yeah, should be one hell of a family reunion."

"Hey, nobody puts the fun in dysfunctional like we do," Max said as she walked through the doorway. "The team just radioed in. _Daddy's_ on his way."

xxXXxx

_Thanks for reading, and for being so patient during my infrequent updates. Large chunks of this story are already written and should be posted soon (and by soon I mean someday, but hopefully someday soon). Feedback is __**always**__ appreciated._


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